Nick Montana

Joe Montana was in a Seattle sports bar recently watching a Notre Dame football game when he noticed a familiar name trotting onto the field unexpectedly. Nate Montana is the backup quarterback for the Fighting Irish, his father’s alma mater, and the starter had just been injured.

“When he goes in, we all started screaming,” Montana said. “My wife (Jennifer) said to me a couple times, ‘Sit down, please.”’

And with that, one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history — a four -time Super Bowl winner with the 49ers — sat down to watch one of his two sons currently playing major college football.

Nate, a junior, has made one appearance for Notre Dame since joining the team as a walk-on two years ago. Nick, a freshman, was a hot recruit pursued by many top schools and ultimately chose Washington. He is sitting out this season as a redshirt but viewed as a potential starter next season.

Watching them play has always been an emotional experience for Montana. He gets excited and worried, nervous and proud. Ask him to describe what it’s like, and he sounds much more like a father than a Hall of Fame quarterback.

“It’s a lot of fun, to a certain degree,” Montana said from South Bend, where he planned to watch Notre Dame play Stanford on Saturday. “The other part can be heart-wrenching at times. I know exactly what their emotions are, whether they’re up or down, and that makes it tough.

“You hope they never make a mistake, but you also know that can never be the case. There isn’t anyone who can experience that, who can go through it with them, unless you’ve played the position.”

For Nate, 20, and Nick, 18, playing the same position as their legendary father poses its own challenges.

“There will always be bad stuff if you don’t live up to your dad’s name,” Nick said. “For both of us, ever since Pop Warner, people were talking trash. But it’s been happening since we were young, so it’s easy to get used to.”

Neither son has any memories of watching their father play — Montana retired 16 years ago — and neither felt pressured to play football, to play quarterback or to play for Notre Dame. In fact, Nick was a linebacker until eighth grade.

“One of the things Jen and I heard when they were boys was, ‘You’re not going to make them play football, are you?”’ said Montana, who also has two daughters.

“I didn’t want to push them into it. But we believe sports can be a wonderful teacher about life. They’ve always been pretty competitive. It’s been wonderful to watch them find their way.”

At times, they’ve done it without much help from their father.

Just as Montana is a typical parent when it comes to watching his sons, so are they typical kids when it comes to accepting fatherly advice.

“It’s weird to other people,” Nick said, “but he’s our dad and we had the same reaction everyone does when their dad tells them something: We don’t want to listen. It took us a few years to realize he knows what he’s talking about.”

Said Montana: “At a certain point, you have a lot of stuff locked up in your head, and you say to them, ‘If you don’t ask me, it’s going to waste.’ You don’t want to push yourself on them, but you also want to give them every opportunity to learn.

“It’s a really difficult line. The minute I start watching them practice, I want to talk to them. You don’t want to get in their way, but you think, ‘If I could just help them a little bit here and there.’”

He laughs.

“I’m probably overbearing for both of them.”

Not so, Nick said.

“He’s really laid back. He never pushed us. He never talked about (football). He doesn’t coach us unless we ask for help, but he’s there whenever we need him.”

Nick, 18, was a heavily-recruited prospect at Oaks Christian School in Southern California. He wasn’t interested in Notre Dame and had scholarship offers from Alabama, Ohio State and Stanford. He chose Washington, in part because of his comfort level with the Huskies’ coach, Steve Sarkisian.

“You might think it would be different,” Sarkisian said when asked about recruiting the son of a Hall of Fame quarterback. “But once we got into the process … he became a normal dad.

“It was not about Joe Montana. It was about Nick Montana, and they made that very clear. Joe and Jennifer did a great job throughout the entire process of allowing him to be recruited.”

Nate, 20, played for Cardinal Newman High in Santa Rosa, then transferred to prep powerhouse De La Salle in Concord for his senior season.

There was never much doubt that he’d end up at Notre Dame. As a kid, Nate attended games with his dad. As a teenager, he visited the campus with his older sisters, Alexandra and Elizabeth, who are recent Notre Dame graduates.

“It was the place I wanted to go,” Nate said. ‘My dad left it up to me. It wasn’t his decision by any means.”

But the decision meant he would face constant scrutiny.

“There’s definitely attention to his name,” Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly said. “He carries himself very, very well for having to be in the shadow of a legend. I can’t imagine how difficult it is.”

Nate, who wears No. 16 — the same number Montana wore with the 49ers — did not play as a freshman, then spent one season at Pasadena City College to gain experience. He returned to Notre Dame last spring as the second-string quarterback.

His only appearance thus far — a loss to archrival Michigan in which he completed 8 of 17 passes with an interception — came the day his parents were in Seattle visiting Nick.

They will be sitting in the stands at Notre Dame Stadium on Saturday, rooting for the Irish, hoping Nate gets a chance to play — nervous, excited, worried, proud. Who knows, Dad may need to be told to please settle down at some point.

“It’s just really fun watching them,” Montana said.

For more on college sports, see Jon Wilner’s College Hotline at blogs.mercurynews.com/collegesports. Contact him at jwilner@mercurynews.com or 408-920-5716.

*** Here’s a story I wrote for Friday’s Merc about Nick and Nate Montana (Nate plays for Notre Dame, which plays Stanford).

Joe was gracious enough to chat with me by phone for a few minutes — he’s in South Bend this weekend — and was very honest about the bittersweet nature of watching his sons play.

The story ran in the Merc’s A section and, given the broad readership, is purposefully not “inside football” …

Joe Montana was in a Seattle sports bar recently watching his alma mater, Notre Dame, play football when he noticed a familiar name trotting onto the field unexpectedly. Nate Montana is the backup quarterback for the Fighting Irish, and the starter had been injured.

“When he goes in, we all started screaming,” Montana said. “My wife (Jennifer) said to me a couple times, ‘Sit down, please.'”

And with that, one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history — a four -time Super Bowl winner with the 49ers — sat down to watch one of his two sons currently playing major college football.

Action: USC pursues coaching candidates with NBA backgrounds.Reaction I: Because athletic director Mike Garrett’s previous hires who fit that model (Henry Bibby and Tim Floyd) worked out so darn well.Reaction II: Reggie Theus is interviewing today, according to the LA Times. No surprise there. He has always struck me as a Garrett kind of guy.

While doing some post-vacation catching up, I spotted a football recruiting story on espn.com that caught my eye because of two names: Biggins and Montana.

Nick Montana is Joe’s son, of course. After playing for De La Salle’s JV team, he transferred to Southern California powerhouse Oaks Christian last summer, where he joined Trevor Gretzky and Trey Smith (Will’s son).

After a sizzling junior year, Montana has emerged as the No. 11 QB prospect in the class of ’10, according to scout.com